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Let Boris have a nap Why is the need for sleep seen as a sign of weakness?

Low energy. Photo by Mitchell Gunn/Getty Images

Low energy. Photo by Mitchell Gunn/Getty Images


January 21, 2021   4 mins

Naps are fantastic. Whether it’s a second sleep at 8am after a disrupted night, a power nap after lunch, or a disco nap before a late shift: naps rock.

For a few brief hours this week it seemed the Prime Minister was, like me, a nap fan, catching 40 winks every now and again in his hectic schedule. It was a glorious moment of nap-rebranding. Apparently, this is another way in which our bombastic leader was just like his idol Winston Churchill. Naps aren’t just for babies and toddlers, the message rang out. No, they can be a power tool for leaders, to help them surge through the day from dawn til midnight.

And then someone in Downing Street panicked and a withering denial was issued by the PM’s spokesman. Naps are for wimps, they might as well have said, not for our guy BoJo. What a wasted opportunity to bond with a sleep-deprived nation, where lack of good quality pillow time is costing us £40bn a year.

Sleep is one of the three most important things humans do, along with eating and drinking. Without these three basics, we quite literally can’t do anything. Our bodies stop functioning properly. So why is sleep the only one people eternally boast about doing without?

Yes: there are clean eating and fasting trends, but anyone who goes for less than one proper meal a day is basically considered a kook by mainstream society, in the same bucket as people who steam their vaginas. No one has ever crafted a political narrative about how little they eat: even freakishly thin celebrities usually claim they consume loads and “have a fast metabolism”.

And does anyone ever show off their bravado by claiming they like to get through the day in a state of chronic dehydration? My wisecracking stepfather habitually claims he never drinks water, because fish poo in it. But even he drinks other fluids without a modicum of shame.

But sleep machismo? It’s everywhere. Margaret Thatcher, Donald Trump and Richard Branson have all claimed to need only four hours of sleep. Business “influencers” endlessly exhort us to get up at 5 or even 4am. The latest self-help book phenomenon is the Power Hour which tells us we can get everything we want done if we only get up an hour earlier. Ignoring the fact that what most of us want to do is get an extra hour’s sleep.

Millions of us are chronically sleep deprived. One in three, according to the NHS, putting us at risk of developing obesity, heart disease and diabetes as well being an all round grumpy sod for half the day. Good sleep makes you happier. It improves your sex drive and your fertility. It can help you get slimmer, wards off a range of health conditions, and even helps boost your immunity. Sleep deprivation has been linked to several air disasters, while the risks of dying in surgery far greater if the medic has not had a proper night’s sleep. Since none of us would want our pilot or surgeon to be sleep deprived, why would we praise it in the men and women making life-and-death decisions in government, and whose errors can kill thousands.

Since the pandemic, millions are getting worse sleep. They may have to get up earlier or stay up later to fit work around caring commitments or home schooling. Sleep may be disrupted by the simple anxiety of this hellish year, or by addictive doom scrolling for news on social media sites. Sleep disruption is also one of the cruel symptoms of Long Covid: the enduring illness many coronavirus patients are now reporting — often with no end in sight.

One simple recommendation made by lots of sleep experts is to practise sleep hygiene by keeping your bedroom exclusively for sleeping: but of course you can’t do that if, like for many younger workers, the bed is the only quiet place to work.

So this was a moment for the Prime Minister to shout it loud and proud in favour of good sleep. Yes, damn it, I take a nap sometimes, he should have said, hammering his fist down on the Despatch box.

Was it just machismo that prevented this? Or was it a bigger issue? This after all was a week in which rumours circulated of a desire to deregulate Britain’s workplaces and reduce workers’ rights. If the PM made the case that — sometimes — naps make you better at your job, would he come under pressure to make work more flexible for everyone? So that everyone who’d benefit from the flexibility to juggle their working hours and power up with a bit of shut eye could do so? Of course he would.

He might also have come under pressure from sleep evangelists (well, me, for sure) to make changes to our public health services so the help with sleep is available for every one, especially parents who are struggling. There’s a sound public health case to invest in better sleep for all of us: flexible working schedules; proper advice and support. Perhaps most of all, though, we need an about turn on the anti-nap stigma that sees sleep as a sign of weakness instead of a sign of strength.

Of course, there’s a healthy debate to be had about whether Boris Johnson is a good prime minister. And sure, if he’s just passing out at his desk because he had a kilo of pasta and a bottle of wine for lunch, then questions should be asked. But please, come clean and admit that the spokesperson was wrong to correct the story. The naps happen. They’re a good idea.


Polly Mackenzie is Director of Demos, a leading cross-party think tank. She served as Director of Policy to the Deputy Prime Minister from 2010-2015.

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David J
David J
3 years ago

Sleep is only comsidered weakness by feeble commentators, or those with a need to prove themselves.
I’ve been power napping ““ 10 minutes usually – since my early 30s, and it’s a great way to recharge for the rest of the day, and evening.

Andrew Best
Andrew Best
3 years ago

If people are complaining because he had a nap,
Get a life because you are complaining about nothing.
Is this the level of journalists and commentators nowadays?
You all thought you were going to break a Watergate story instead you moan about a nap!
What a wonderful profession you are

Gerry Fruin
Gerry Fruin
3 years ago
Reply to  Andrew Best

I have said in another post along with many Unheard commentators about the plummeting standards on the board. This a classic nonsense piece written I assume by a pre-teen. Question is can anything be done?
Well I have stopped watching TV years ago as with radio (news and the Today program) and find news via the internet. Which I have to admit in most cases is only marginally better.
Perhaps ‘news’ as I suspect many want it to be – Factual is finished. I link to this site not for the OTT American content but for the debates in the comments.
These are infinitely more interesting, perhaps some of the commentators may be allowed to contribute with an article. Of course I assume (dangerous word) that they will have to have a Union card. Hey Ho as I thought there was a flaw in that idea. Still the BBC is good for one thing. About every 6 months I check my watch with the 1pm pips:-)

Johnny Sutherland
Johnny Sutherland
3 years ago
Reply to  Andrew Best

Is this the level of journalists and commentators nowadays?

YES

mark.schoenenberger.03
mark.schoenenberger.03
3 years ago

EXCELLENT PIECE… This shows wonderful creativity in underlining a sinister public health danger in our technological society. Electric lighting and television have lured our eyeballs to stay open when we’re exhausted… Sleep is the only time that your lymphatic system operates in your brain. Lack of sleep will allow all manner off waste products to accumulate, contributing to all sorts of neurological pathologies.

Stuart Mill
Stuart Mill
3 years ago

Here is why such criticism might be deserved: because Bojo would have ruthlessly mocked the leader of the opposition if caught napping.

Ian Ogden
Ian Ogden
3 years ago

I agree with the PM and take no truck from anyone who dissapoves of him or I closing our eyes at any time we need to. It is no concern of anyone else unless they feel important enough to pass comment. Having said that, I apologise for feeling important.

Warren Alexander
Warren Alexander
3 years ago

Yaaaaaaaaaawwwwwwwnnnnnn. I’d be happy to sleep until all this is over, the pubs and restaurants are open, I can mooch around a bookshop and people stop leaping into moving traffic to avoid being a millimetre too close to someone.

Mayte Fernandez
Mayte Fernandez
3 years ago

Bojo is an Absolutly incompetent Little fat boy
Needs a NAP because down deep he just can’t with the responsibility all his decisions are late taken and on top the wrong ones!! which is why ppl is dying in this country like flies
It’s a mistake after the other one he is a living walking disaster honestly
Thinking about it Maybe his lack of grey matter makes him so tired because he needs to remember all his lies….lol that’s why he needs naps?? Lol
anyway… its a shame to have a PM like him who’s representing Britons in the world!! indeed…